Who to Root for in Monster Movies

Seeing that monster movies fall within the purview of fantasy and science fiction, I give you a short thinker-blog for consideration. You go to Godzilla ready to cheer on humanity, but often times there’s more than one monster and the monsters fight each other. A simple hierarchy exists in knowing which monster to root for. Ask any little boy; he’ll know.

If it’s monster against humans, you root for the human as long as he’s not Hitler or someone like that. But what is the natural order between monsters? Take it from the little boy still in my brain: First you pick the monster mammal, then the reptile, followed by any other vertebrate, but never the insect or worm.

So in Godzilla versus King Kong, you’re going to be drawn into cheering on King Kong. In Godzilla versus Rodan, you go for Godzilla taking out that thing. In Godzilla versus giant cockroaches, for sure, your money’s on Godzilla. See how this works? Sometimes Godzilla is the hero.

In monster against monster, some poor city is still destroyed because monsters rarely duke it out in the country. What’s the fun of that? The adult side of me hates to see the destruction, but the little boy in me likes monsters tromping through town and falling into buildings.

Whichever city the fight’s in is toast. You know, you eat a Chinatown and an hour later you’re hungry.